America lied.

He didn’t mean it. The poor lad probably thought he was as innocent as a newborn babe, and he would keep it that way. But Horatio Alger had died twenty years ago, Marilyn Monroe wept in the darkness of the media, Benjamin Franklin sat on his rocking chair and thought about his estranged son. The America dream was like the apple pie, always looking better than it tasted, like mother had put too much salt into the apples.

All countries lied, though. He knew it. It was very noble and honorable to lie. They had awards for it, and the honor to lie was placed in the victors. The dead could not protest so much. But it hadn’t really mattered until they sat in the back of some oversized car in the drive-thru movie theatre with an ancient film rolling on and America leaned over and sloppily kissed him, open-mouthed and like a dog, all tongue and saliva. It wasn’t very pleasant.

And sometimes America would show up at his door, three in the morning, face as bright as the moon. Sometimes he would accidentally break the window as he crawled in the third floor, bouquet of flowers in his hand. Sometimes he would set off the burglar alarm and scare off the stray cats that stayed in the living room of his house (because he could never say no to stray cats and the mansion was too big for him anyway and just too small with America in it). America said it was romantic, and he pretended to reluctantly agree, but it felt like

It felt like the story of Pinocchio, the boy who told lies and his nose grew longer and longer. Except it felt like the nose had grown into a cage, because every time America said I love you he could only smile sickly and agree, but he thought

He didn’t know what he thought, except that America didn’t understand, didn’t mean it. He was too young, too stupid, too shallow, and it was all his fault, and he couldn’t say otherwise. He knew what America really meant, knew that America thought this was what love was. Didn’t know the difference between brother and lover. Didn’t think his brother was too much of a coward to explain it.

Maybe he could have told this to America if he hadn’t been so fearful of spending another night feeding stray cats who would just leave him the next day. But he, too, was a liar, except he knew it like the throbbing sound of his heart.

There was only one time he had told the truth. Decades ago, when the sky had still been blue, when America was still small enough to be held, small hands grappling at his shirt, and he had whispered into his hair that he would always love him.